Among the top 6 though, it will come down to PCS. If someone like Maxwell, Gao, or Bulanhaugi skates really great, I can see something like what happened to Adam Rippon happening to them, getting bumped down in the rankings to like 4th or below even when if they outperform the favorites.

I thought Adam Rippon overscored in both programs.
His long had 2 faulty triple axels, which are his two hardest jumps. That LP didn't deserve 150+.
He was 4th after the SP for a faulty lutz and crashed into the board over a flawless Armin.

Agree with Flattfan - there was no "holding up" PCS marks in the men's SP over the "new guys". They looked pretty fair and on par with what these guys should see internationally if they skate the same. Johnny a little lower due to being slower (SS) than Abbott and Lysacek. Abbott - you can really see the figures work he's done in his clear and solid edgework.

The inflation will come later I think. In the ladies event, there are what, 24 entries? And I'm sure half of those entries will attempt a 3lz-2t, 3f, and 2a in the short, and probably 6 or 10 will be clean on the jumps, meaning PCS will decide who gets what place.

So how do we think those PCS should be decided?

Not on reputation, right?

But on how each skater actually fulfills the criteria for each of the components.

I predict that, for the most part, the skaters who are already considered to have better reputations will earn higher PCS because they will meet most of those criteria better. That's a lot of what earned them good results in the past and therefore the good reputations they enjoy.

Some of the top skaters also have persistent weaknesses in some of the PCS criteria, and some of the criteria are subject to significant variation between an "on" performance and "off" one from the same skater. So some of those component scores may end up being very different from what the skaters have sometimes earned in the past and what earned them their reputations.

GOEs will also make a difference in total scores and results, especially if everyone lands the same jumps and earns approximately the same levels on non-jump elements. We know which skaters tend to have the best positions and extension, spin fastest and longest, cover the most ice with their spirals, achieve the deepest and most secure edges in their step sequences. If they execute those elements approximately as well as they usually do, we know which skaters should earn higher points on those elements.

Just landing the same jumps doesn't put everyone on the same footing either. Quality of the jumps will matter as well -- height, speed in and out, correctness of takeoff and landing edges, full rotation, control of body positions in the air and on the landings, etc. The skaters who do those things well will earn higher GOEs and therefore more points for the jumps than the skaters who just squeak them out.

Only after you account for all those differences in the actual skating can any remaining discrepancy be attributed to reputation.

In long programs, does landing one or two more harder or cleaner jumps make up for less power and projection, for example, throughout the 4 or 4 1/2 minutes?

I am still scratching my head when I look at the protocol sheets and see a -2 GOE for a fall (when it's obviously supposed to receive an automatic -3), or a +3 for an element that had no business getting that score... Ugh. This sometimes happens worldwide as well.

If the U.S. insists on continuing to pick it's Olympic teams based on one competition, in which skaters are sometimes separated by tenths of a point, I really wish we could at least make sure that skaters who fall actually receive the automatic -3 GOE from every judge.

With all this chatter about score inflation, I've been pleasantly surprised that we didn't see that at this Nationals.

Jeremy Abbott certainly got a really high score, but I would expect so after he did 8 triples and a quad. Patrick Chan didn't do nearly that much technically and he got a similar score for his FS.

And it looks like PCS has only been a minor factor here. I think Lysacek and Weir got some reputation PCS during the FS, but it's not much higher than what Ryan Bradley or Adam Rippon got.

Any thoughts on why the U.S. judges aren't inflating scores so far?

In terms of the top US male skaters, I agree that the inflation was minimal, which was very impressive after comparing with the other nationals (e.g., Canadian, Russian, Japan, all around the world in this Olympic season).

Well...but for the lady's SP, I think the top 4's scores were inflated. No edge call for the obvious case (i.e., Sasha's Flutz), generous GOE and levels on the other elements, and relatively high PCS. Let me see in LP. Who know there would be a US lady receiving over 200